It's good to be back!

Today, it is exactly two months since we tied up at Shelter Island for our first cruise of the year. Since then, a lot has happened to keep us from boating and we won't bore you with the details except to say that Bill became ill with a blocked intestine.  It took about six weeks, but Frances supervised his recovery and we are again back on the boat, anxious to take advantage of what summer we have left.

After about four weeks, Bill felt well enough to get back on the boat and the first order of business was to have the starboard alternator rebuilt. That alternator had been the cause of our continuing engine failure problem and even with a bandaged stomach (and some help), Bill managed to take the damn alternator off and take it to our favorite electric shop to be rebuilt.  After seeing the condition of this thing on the bench, we elected to buy a new one and on the following weekend installed it (this time without any help).

We waited around for some good weather and last weekend, took the boat down river for a shakedown cruise. The boat ran fine even going a lot faster than we usually do but Pooka the boat cat became a little seasick and Frances wrapped him in a damp towel to help control his panting.

He survived just fine (he has been on lots of boat trips with us before) and was able to again stand guard back at the marina on his favorite perch.

This weekend, it was time to begin to get ready for our planned cruise to Block Island later this month.  Our shakedown cruise did stir up some of the water in the bilge and it gave the interior of the boat a moldy smell.  We cured that on Saturday by poring an entire bottle of Pine Sol disinfectant into the bilge. Not a good idea, it turned out, unless you like your boat smelling like a public rest room.

On Sunday morning, the Pine Sol smell became just too much to take so we flushed the bilge with water, lots of it. Suds came pouring out of the bilge pump but after about five flushes, we saw a real improvement. There were still some suds in the bilge when we took this picture, but eventually it disappeared.

Frances likes things nice and clean so we ended up sucking the last of the old bilge water out with one of those gusher hand pumps. Bill pumped while Frances held the discharge hose in the sink.

She doesn't look happy, but she is. The Pine Sol smell is gone (or at least at a tolerable level) and we are good to go for our next adventure: Block Island.

We have one more weekend to get everything ready and the list of what we'll need is growing. It is so good to be back on our boat!